Hey guys, yesterday I finally bought my 1988 Firebird Formula. Its a project car, needs some work.

The tranny does something weird. With the cluch pushed in and shifting the gears, its notchy. Like it doesnt liek to go into reverse and you always have to go into 5th before reverse.

I think the clutch needs to be bled, shifter oil needs to be changed, and my question is would a new clutch help? Thats it
Thanks hope to see you later. Bye

 

You always have to put the trans in a forward gear before putting it into reverse. Otherwise, if the motor is running and you just push the clutch and try to jam it into reverse, all the guts will still be spinning, and it will grind like a hamurger-making machine. Reverse has no synchronizer.

The clutch probably doesn't need to be bled, and the shifter has no oil, and a new clutch will not change that. Reverse still won't have a synchronizer.

Just get in the habit of putting it in a forward gear (any forward gear will do) before putting it in reverse, like all the rest of us have been doing with 3-, 4-, and 5-speeds since forever.

You might find it amusing to know, that the first car I had with a manual transmission (60 Chevy) had the shifter on the steering column; was a 3-speed; and not only was reverse non-synchronized, but first also didn't have a synchro. So you had to put it in 2nd or 3rd before 1st, as well as before reverse.

Wouldn't hurt to change the fluid though. That trans should use ATF.

 

well i figured the reverse gear was no problem, but even some forward gears are hard to get it into gear. Liek 3rd. And it misses shifts a lot. Would the clutch fix that?

And a clutch quadrant went out on my friends mustang and it ground 2nd. Could this have anything to do with it?

 

Maybe. Stiff shifting in all gears is almost always caused by a clutch that doesn't release properly.

Don't know what a clutch quadrant is. If it failed in your friend's Mustang, don't let your car get close to it, in case it's contagious. But I've only been driving and building stick shift cars for 30 years or so, so maybe I have something to learn. In an automaitc car, the "shift quadrant" is the official name for the PRNDL.

 

http://www.steeda.com/store/-catalog...ickRelease.htm

 

Oi ve...

Leave it to F*rd to put a piece of plastic in the clutch limkage. No wonder I'm not familiar with such a thing. I've seen similar things in fornt-drivers, would never have thought of that name for them.

Our cars have no such thing, since our clutches (most of them) are hydraulic, not cable-operated.

 

alright its pretty hard to shift so i need to replace the clutch soon (it chatters too) and the fluid.

Any recommendations? The car is bone dead stock and I wont be changing it away from stock until i put the new engine/new tranny in too (hehe)